Naomi Wolf: You & Your Substack, ARE the Op-Ed Outlet for the 'MAGA/MAHA Comms Team', now! Legacy Op-Ed Outlets NO LONGER Legitimate! Plant your Flag! Claim this Czarina role we ALL want you to claim!

I disagree with a central point in Naomi Wolf's “Dear Team Trump: Don’t ‘Spike the Football’; Rather, Balance the Language and Walk Through the Biggest-Ever Open Door” essay

For readers who may not be fully familiar with the key figures working tirelessly—both overtly and behind the scenes—to save the American Republic and its People, you might not be aware of one of its key players: Naomi Wolf. I encourage you to subscribe to her Substack (here).

Yale and Rhodes Scholar, “Arts & Letters”-educated. When Wolf attended those two hallowed institutions of higher learning, earning degrees there truly meant something. Graduates emerged with skills in sound reasoning, critical thinking, and the art of persuasive communication. Back then, students were imbued with a sense of agency and civic pride—the world is your oyster, you’re one of the “chosen ones” we entrust in keeping the Flame of Democracy America alive as embodied in its sacred documents—the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. (*) (**)

(*) The thought now occurs to me: In the most general of terms, I’d have no problems, virtually no problems at all, with the ‘guiding hand’ of the Professional Managerial Class in America over the last 120 plus years, if there were more Naomi Wolfs in it, at all strata and levels…

(**) I always sense a sense of agency and civic pride in the spirit of Naomi Wolf—every time I listen to one of her podcasts (whether when she’s interviewing a guest or monologging), and every time I read one of her essays. It was this past summer—during my daily late-morning walk, that I had first starting listening—the podcasts were dropping into my substack app feed on my iPhone. (I’ve only ever been to her substack, and never to her other sites/channels—one of the them being DailyClout. Does DailyClout have both essays and video/audio podcasts there, or just video/audio podcasts? I’m a big fan of both essays and audio (not video) podcasts, and I love how substack makes the consumption of both seamless… These—the essays, and the substack platform itself—all become important as revealed below…)

Without further ado, let’s jump into the slow-windup of my critique:

Now, if you initially perceive what follows to be me nitpicking (it’s not), I ask you to bear with me as I this buildup to what I have to really say—which is important.

Naomi Wolf’s essay, “Dear Team Trump: Don’t ‘Spike the Football’; Rather, Balance the Language and Walk Through the Biggest-Ever Open Door”, opens with the following lede:

Below is my latest unsolicited letter to the MAGA/MAHA comms [communications] and leadership team.

Wolf posted her essay thirteen days after Trump won the 2024 presidential election—uncontested by Harris and called by mainstream media outlets—with simple majority wins in both the House and Senate to boot.

So why not just make the lede, “Below is my latest unsolicited letter to president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team”? Doing so would make the lede align with the title of the essay itself: “Dear Team Trump: […] Balance [your] Language and Walk Through the Biggest-Ever Open Door”.

Then, further down in Wolf’s essay, we have this:

MAGA/MAHA has the opportunity to solidify the largest potential realignment in American history; to create messaging, events and speeches that would welcome into a new Unity Movement, the majority of Americans, and that would make the rationale for the very existence of the Democratic party, obsolete.

In the way in which the term “MAGA/MAHA” is used here, I assume Wolf means the “MAGA/MAHA comms [communications] and leadership team”—which means, post-election—president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team:

“President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team has the opportunity to solidify the largest potential realignment in American history; to create messaging, events and speeches that would welcome into a new Unity Movement, the majority of Americans, and that would make the rationale for the very existence of the Democratic party, obsolete.”

So, now I’m going to replace “MAGA/MAHA” in the following two paragraphs with [President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team]:

[President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team] has the opportunity to unite into one movement, of citizens heading in roughly one aligned direction, millions of people of patriotism and essential goodwill in America, whatever their policy differences. This realignment could radically restore and re-empower America and Americans, and could also unleash untold innovation, public safety and community-mindedness, civic engagement, and cultural and material wealth.

If [president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team] did this—that is, walked with maturity and grace through this historic, unprecedented, transpartisan open door—it would revitalize and transform the Republican party, making the MAGA/MAHA movement into a big, unbeatable tent whose mission is to promote core American principles. This mission could replace the always-marginal, always-vulnerable status of the Republican party, which has devolved (as has the DNC) into a checklist of ever more extreme policy itemizations.

Wolf encourages president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team to be thoughtful and well-reasoned in their communications with the public. To have written mission statements and written op-eds that complement any live speeches—from, say, Trump, Vance, Kennedy:

…all three of these principals [Trump, Vance, Kennedy] are less effective in-person only, than they would be in-person and with some good, well-placed print op-eds. […] For reasons I can’t understand, [president-elect Trump’s] comms teams are not making use of the actual op-ed pages of legacy media. These still represent the most powerful real estate in media.

[…] be disciplined; be grown-ups. […] a series of well-reasoned op-eds, in language that third graders but also diplomats and international affairs experts can all understand (and yes, that voice is possible to achieve; President Reagan achieved it). […]

[…] where is the [MAGA/MAHA movement] mission-statement appeal to all of America—the explanation of core values and goals? These too should be appearing in speeches and on [legacy media] op-ed pages [in writing].

[emphasis added in bold]

Op-Ed: An op-ed (short for “opposite the editorial page”) is a type of written prose commonly found in newspapers, magazines, and online publications. They usually represent a writer’s strong and focused opinion on an issue of relevance to a targeted audience.

Continuing…

I know that now [president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team] can go around legacy media by simply popping up on socials or on independent podcasts, and that is exciting. But much as I value the new media (and [the] DailyClout [podcast] is an example of it)—it is not always the right platform for the [written] mission statement essays, or the calm, well-reasoned fireside chats, that ultimately solidify the support and goodwill of all of America, and that the American people deserve. […]

[…] [A podcast] is not the format provided by [a written] op-ed or published speech, that can explain the point of [the] MAGA/MAHA [movement] to undecideds or to the defeated.

[emphasis added in bold]

Continuing…

X is awesome for posting zingy memes or stream-of-consciousness apercus. I love it for that purpose. But there is also a reason you [my readers] also come to me here on Substack—to understand in (reasoned, well-documented) longer essays — op-ed-page-type essays, if [legacy media] op-ed pages still would publish me — what lies behind my thinking posted in brief formats on social media. You [my readers] come [to my substack] to be not punched in the gut or seduced by a slogan, but to be reasoned to; and reasoned with [by reading my long-form, (written-out) essays].

To be persuaded, the old-fashioned way [through [Thomas Paine -level] writing and vision].

So by all means, President Trump and RFK Jr, go past the legacy media [with your ‘short forms’].

But also get your Peggy Noonans [*] [and Ted Sorensens] [*] [of this generation], fast, into Mar a Lago.

[emphasis added in bold]

[*] [Peggy Noonan was a speechwriter for President Reagan. Ted Sorensen was a speechwriter for JFK. The point is, they could write, craft messages and position papers and well-reasoned long-form essays—not just speeches. Question: Isn’t Trump’s speechwriting team—currently headed up Stephen Miller (?), currently doing this?]

Continuing…

President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team — “with [their] version of the Peggy Noonans [and] the Ted Sorensons of this generation [the long-form political essayists and speech writers of this generation]—[…] can solidify and move forward with a bought-in, persuaded America.”

[…]

[Through writing, President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team] can build a majoritarian movement that is humane, and that governs with empathy as well as with strength; that is oriented toward peace and freedom; that can explain itself and its beliefs; that can lastingly illuminate our nation’s ideals; that can draw on the best policies of all, generated from the brightest minds of left, right and center; and that can, not least, also —

Liberate and bring peace to the rest of the struggling, censored, and suffering world.

[emphasis added in bold]

And finally…

[President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team needs to [have] published [in] the [legacy media] op-ed [outlets] […] essays that are serious, explaining the reasoning and sound policy behind what can now seem like Sesame-Street-type, cartoonish popups of favored insiders dropping what may appear at first to be potentially lethal or economically devastating or militarily rash bombshells in brief clips on social media or in leaked explosive headlines on the networks.

Invite the [legacy] op-ed editor[s] of The Washington Post […]; The Wall Street Journal; and yes, The New York Times; to Mar a Lago. Invite the publishers of The Financial Times, USAToday, The Los Angeles Times.

Give a serious speech about the war [Israel-Palestine, Ukraine-Russia], that is brief, and send the [transcript] to be reprinted in full in [the op-ed pages of the legacy] USAToday and The Washington Post.

Give a serious speech about cutting whole departments; and do the same.

Give a serious speech about the planned courts-martial; and do the same.

You get it.

Yes, you won the battle. Yes, you can tell the rest of the world to go to hell. Yes, you can play fun policy games with billionaires and cavort on socials.

Your base will go crazy with the fun of it all.

But will you win the war?

If you don’t send out grownup [written] mission statements and [transcripts of] speeches to serious people and places—even to the people and places that you hate—as well as wielding swinging Visigothic hatchets on social media, you risk winning the battle but losing the war.

And you risk losing the peace.

[…]

If the party at Mar a Lago does not bring in some serious nonpartisan grownups, to balance and lastingly articulate the mission [in writing] of what can at times look a bit like a frat boy esprit de corps popping champaign corks, at this point—you risk losing the biggest opportunity in modern American history to establish a majoritarian movement, that can make the DNC into an afterthought of the history books.

But if you do take my advice and do so—bring in your version of the Peggy Noonans, the Ted Sorensons of this generation, along with a parallel, serious media strategy—you can solidify and move forward with a bought-in, persuaded America.

[emphasis added in bold]

My Response:

A categorically resounding “NO” to president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team: NO engaging directly with those (those employees) manning the Legacy Media Op-Ed Outlets!

A complete and thorough breaking of ‘diplomatic relations’ with these scum!

If these legacy media scum wish to really, really talk directly with president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team, then they can petition the Swiss embassy in Washington DC, asking them for assistance in brokering such a deal.

We’re done! NO more engaging directly with the journalists employed at Legacy Media: The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Financial Times, USAToday, The Los Angeles Times, Politico, and The Atlantic, and their European counterparts.

Instead, president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team needs to come to You & Your substack directly, Naomi, to disseminate their long-form screeds.

You—with your substack, IS THE Op-Ed Outlet, now! The Legacy Media Op-Ed Outlets are NO LONGER Legitimate!

We need you Naomi! Plant your Flag! Claim this Czarina role (“Czarina of the Op-Ed Outlets”) we ALL want you to claim!

Don’t just leave this Czarina role solely to center-right Bari Weiss, should she even be interested (maybe she is, will be, interested; I don’t know).

But then, how does president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team engage directly with the serious-people on the “other side of the aisle” [with the (cough, cough) serious-people political enemies]?

Yes, that’s a good question.

Here’s the answer:

Via substack: The hottest platform for “political” long-form written coverage.

The “other side of the aisle” journalists are already here, on substack. To name of few of the big ones:

Heather Cox Richardson
Dan Rather
Robert Reich
Judd Legam
Joyce Vance
Dan Pfeiffer
Steven Beschloss
Jay Kuo
Steve Schmidt

The talking heads at FoxNews, and CNN, and all of the rest of the Television legacy media, can read off of their teleprompters—from their studio desks, the news that president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team only releases their written statements digitally to Writer’s/Publications on substack—regardless of what side of the aisle they’re on…

President-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team, needs to unequivocally take this “no compromise” approach, now.

And this is my unsolicited letter, Naomi—that you claim the role of “Czarina of the Op-Ed Outlets”—in order to help us unequivocally win this war and unequivocally secure its peace.

Addendum-1:

Again, no need to reach out to Legacy Media Op-Ed Outlets. The Writers on Substack are the Op-Ed Outlets now… That’s the opportunity to be claimed and proselytized; and, Naomi Wolf would be an ideal spokesperson for this.

The ‘snubbing’ of journalists employed at the Legacy Media Op-Ed Outlets becomes implied in the spokesperson’s talking-points. If a ‘journo’ explicitly calls-out the ‘snubbing’, the retort is: “the full spectrum of left and right political views, in written long-form, already exists on substack.” As Marc Andreessen pointed out to Joe Rogan recently:

Emphasis added in bold:

Joe Rogan Experience #2234 — Marc Andreessen (Nov 27, 2024):

37:40

MARC ANDREESSEN: […] you need to have like a spine of Steel if you’re going to hold back the censorship pressure. And there’s basically… Substack… the company I’m involved in [have a financial stake in] is doing very well…

JOE ROGAN: I love substack.

MARC ANDREESSEN: …smaller than Twitter but doing extremely well…

JOE ROGAN: Fantastic.

MARC ANDREESSEN: and they’ve done a great job… of holding the line on this [the censorship pressure]… and then, obviously…

JOE ROGAN: …and it’s an amazing resource. There’s so many brilliant people on substack. I love substack. I get a large percentage of my news [and opinion (i.e., Op-Ed)] from substack. It’s really good. And it’s so valuable. And it’s such a great place for people who are independent journalists and Physicians and scientists to publish their ideas and actually get paid for it, by the people who subscribe to it. I think it’s fantastic.

MARC ANDREESSEN: …and there’s lots of people on the far left and the far right [on substack]. So, you actually have the full [spectrum] [on substack already]… When a far left person gets upset… Somebody working at the New York Times gets mad because they’re [the New York Times is] not far left enough, they quit and they start a substack. And substack welcomes them in; which is why they don’t devolve into a Gab[.com] [attracting Nazi bots] or something like that. Because it [substack] really is a platform that does welcome all comers…

JOE ROGAN: …well, it’s also very difficult to subvert [substack] in that same way [as, say, Gab.com can be subverted] because substack is [long form] essays… You’re reading people’s essays and papers on things. And these are long form things that are very well—in a lot of cases—very well researched. And it’s not the kind of thing you could just sh*t post on—you know, [well,] there are comments—but it’s just like they [the comments] don’t hold the weight that the actual article holds.

MARC ANDREESSEN: …Right. So my partners at work (*), they’ve observed that I tend to be able to inflame situations from time to time. I can tend to be provocative and get people really upset. And so the rule they’ve asked me to comply with is: I’m allowed to write essays, for example, on substack. And I’m allowed to go on long form podcasts. But I’m not allowed to [sh*t] post.

[(*) From ChatGPT: Marc Andreessen is a co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz (also known as a16z), a prominent venture capital firm based in Silicon Valley. The company invests in technology startups across various sectors, including software, fintech, crypto, and more. […] Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has invested in Substack, the popular platform for independent writers and publishers. The firm participated in Substack’s funding rounds, including a $65 million Series B round in 2021, which valued Substack at approximately $650 million at the time. This investment aligns with a16z’s focus on backing companies that empower creators and innovate in content monetization.]

[…]

MARC ANDREESSEN: So, the good news is, I am allowed to go on podcasts.

JOE ROGAN: That’s good news.

MARC ANDREESSEN: I bring it up, though, because it’s your substack thing. It’s because, it’s basically, ‘Mark, you need you need to explain yourself in long form’. You can’t just say a thing—exactly, to your example… you can’t just say a thing and have people extrapolate from it… they’ll extrapolate… it’s not their fault because you haven’t… it’s your fault because you haven’t explained it right. And so, if you write something long form, or if you go talk for three hours, at least the context will be there. And then if they want to get mad at you, that’s fine, but you can point everybody to the transcript and it’s clear that that’s not what you meant.

JOE ROGAN: Do you also think while you’re writing how things could be misconstrued, so let me, like, do a really good job of being very clear about this?

MARC ANDREESSEN: 100%

Addendum-2:

Raw transcript of Naomi Wolf talking about her essay (Dec 2, 2024) (link)

Emphasis added in bold:

43:31

[…] There's a media vacuum [without forward assertive [long-form] media storytelling coming out of president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team, and coming out on a constant, steady basis] and that's always dangerous.

43:53

I mean, there's the stream of news is about Trump's picks. […] The news stream is about Trump's picks. That's normal.

44:22

But what that means is that in the absence of other forward assertive media storytelling [(*)] from both Trump's camp and RFK Jr.'s camp, it means that there's a wide open target on each of these nominees by the legacy media, that legacy media can pick apart every one of these nominees and undermine [(**)]

[(*) forward assertive media storytelling: I like that. Long-form.

[(**) I would amend this with the following tactic: Categorically ignore the journalists employed at Legacy Media, but reach out to the “other side of the aisle” journalists that have substacks (for example: Heather Cox Richardson, Dan Rather, Robert Reich, Judd Legam, Joyce Vance, Dan Pfeiffer, Steven Beschloss, Jay Kuo, Steve Schmidt)]

44:51

President Trump and his selections in time for the hearings. And that is unwise. And I think there's especially a media vacuum Well, from both camps, right? So what I would love to see is a less, again, a less reactive approach to media. I'd like to see each team say, okay, this week [and then the next week: forward assertive media storytelling], it's gonna be agriculture.

45:17

This week, it's gonna be about everything RFK Jr. did to clean up the Hudson River. This week, it's gonna be about listening to moms across America. That's a great headline, moms across America. and bipartisan town halls, listening to parents, just listening to parents. What are they worried about? What's on their minds?

45:39

Parents are freaking out in this country. And that's a big reason MAHA joined MAGA is the parent vote. Everyone's upset and it's gonna be a bunch of different things. school meals it's going to be propaganda in classrooms it's going to be why aren't kids reading at fifth grade levels anymore or doing math you know but people

46:02

have to that would be a great week um even though education policy is decided locally it's great to show the principals listening um you know. It could be a week on “What is Trump's foreign policy going to look like”? But we're not seeing any of that [forward assertive media storytelling]. We're just seeing… it's like badminton.

46:24

You know, they they lob it back. They lob it back. They lob it back. They lob it back. But they [president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team] never get ahead of it [by employing forward assertive media storytelling; they never ‘fill the vaccum’], respectfully. And, I really… the reason I keep stressing this is… let me just talk about myself. I've been canceled. multiple times at the highest levels,

46:42

three times now at a national and international level, I've been canceled. But guess what? I'm still here with 25 million impressions a month just on X alone. Why am I still here? Why can't they cancel me? They can't cancel me because I know how to do media strategy. And what that means is as they're canceling me,

47:04

from one direction. I'm putting out positive messages, positive messages, positive information, positive information, things you need to know, ways to keep your family healthy, important debates, you know, important analysis in another direction. And that bulletproofs me, right, to some extent. …

47:25

I may not have all of the platforms back that I had before I was most recently globally canceled, but I have a whole bunch of new platforms and I'm going around the old platforms and that wouldn't have happened, right? Imagine if in 2021 or 2019 or 20, you know, 2000, the three times I was, you know,

47:46

nationally or internationally canceled, all I had done was say, no, I'm not crazy. No, I'm not crazy. No, I'm not crazy. I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, over and over and over again, you wouldn't know me except in the, “have you stopped beating your wife…, no,

48:09

I don't beet my wife”, right? But you know me in a bunch of other ways. And you, those of you who've always followed me, never lost faith in me, or I hope not for very long, because I kept my eyes on the prize, right? I kept not turning left or right. I mean,

48:28

not responding unnecessarily to the criticism, except to correct it if it was factually wrong, you know, everywhere I could, but to keep going forward with positive, important information. And also a theme, like what's my mission statement? You know what my mission statement is, right? It's constitution first, you know, and women and children.

48:49

That's my mission statement in a nutshell. What's their [president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team’s] mission statement? I wish I could tell you. America First, that's wonderful. What does that mean? You know, every week we should be hearing from President Trump or his surrogates or op-eds not even written by him. They don't have to write them.

49:07

What is MAGA's [president-elect Trump’s communications and leadership team’s] thesis statement? What's its mission statement when it comes to agriculture, when it comes to foreign policy, when it comes to the border, right? More than what are we gonna do about it? WHAT DO WE BELIEVE? That's what.

49:24

Now [we’re] getting to the core of why I find this so important, this kind of work. President Reagan wasn't just a great president because of his policies, even though I objected to him at the time, because I was an idiot. I was a young Marxist, proto-liberal, or neo-Marxist, I didn't even realize how Marxist,

49:45

but he was a great president because in every speech, and this was Peggy Noonan… it was President Reagan also, knowing how smart that was as an actor,… Understanding the emotion behind the script. In every speech, they explained WHY it mattered. It wasn't just a policy to make peace with the post-Soviet Union, with Gorbachev,

50:13

or leading up to the end of the Soviet Union. It was beautiful speeches explaining what America was in Reagan's vision, which aligned with what a lot of people felt like America was, and then how that flowed into foreign policy related to Reagan over and over and over again.

50:34

And by the way, that's what you always get with me. Look at my essays, right? You may agree with me or not agree with me about the conclusions I reach about abortion or gun rights or any of it. But I always share my thesis statement. I always share my mission statement. “What's the core value that's driving me?”

50:54

I always let you know what it is. And then I show you how, in my view, it plays out in this or that policy or decision or conclusion or insight. People crave that. And we all need that. That's leadership. And America is based on that. Otherwise, if we don't have that thesis statement that we stand for,

51:15

you know, the constitution, freedom, and the rule of law, what are we? You know, and then we can extend that to unity, right? In those values, what are we? We're just a parking lot with a lot of natural resources, right? And by the way, that's why Steve Bannon appeals way across political lines.

51:36

And that's why he and I kind of understood each other, even if we totally don't agree with each other, at a core basis because he's always explaining the mission statement, the core values and reminding us what our core values are as a nation and as a people, because around the world,

51:53

people want freedom and human rights and dignity and agency, as he puts it, right? So RFK Jr. and Trump and their comms teams, hopefully, for both comms teams that are very tried and tested in this space. You can't be amateurs in this space. If RFK Jr. and Trump think it's been difficult,

52:21

it's only going to start being difficult now leading up into the inauguration and then into the confirmation hearings. I mean, the worst is going to be brought out. Unbelievable. opposition research. I'm sure. I'm just guessing. I have no inside knowledge. So you can't have amateurs.

52:38

You can't have people who have not already been PR experts in confirmation hearings. You've got to have people with relationships. […] You have to have... people who know what they're doing, who fought the fight,

52:59

who have the relationships with the press [(*)], and who know how to write a beautiful speech, who know how to write a beautiful op-ed, who know how to explain these very important things to the American people, and who know how to send out these positive stories, positive messages, positive images. It's not a hiatus. [(**)]

[(*) the “other side of the aisle” journalists are already on substack. Ignore the journalists employed at Legacy Media.]

[(**) Substack is the new home for this.]

53:18

I know they're very busy with the transition, but if you have a positive communications strategy, between now and the inauguration, you solidify grassroots constituent support so that people are calling their senators during the confirmation hearings and saying, get Tulsi Gabbard in, get RFK Jr. in, you know, I want these people to serve the president. And that,

53:47

building up those powerful media stories makes people unassailable. And again, just, I don't mean to keep saying, “look, look at me”. […] I'm just trying to say with enough

54:06

positive storytelling, they cannot kill you in the media. They can't do it. So I'm a big believer in it and also in the wisdom of the American people that if you make a reasoned, healthy appeal to their core values, they will align with you, whether they think they like you right now or not.

---

Forward assertive media storytelling? 100%, YES. But, within a bold and provocative move: By ignoring the journalists employed at Legacy Media and going straight to substack — to the “other side of the aisle” journalists: Heather Cox Richardson, Dan Rather, Robert Reich, Judd Legam, Joyce Vance, Dan Pfeiffer, Steven Beschloss, Jay Kuo, Steve Schmidt.

---

Sources:

Dear Team Trump: Don't 'Spike the Football'

"Dear Team Trump: Don't 'Spike the Football'"